


I'll Spread My Wings And Fly

by Ribbons_Undone



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Beaches, Canon Compliant, El Sol, Heaven, M/M, Sand Angels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-14 19:02:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29546964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ribbons_Undone/pseuds/Ribbons_Undone
Summary: Canon Compliant. Set during 15x20.Dean lowered his eyes to where the scalloped shadow of the beach umbrella met the sun, his thoughts slowly turning to the one person who could complete this paradise.Cas.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21
Collections: Profound Bond Gift Exchange: Reunion





	I'll Spread My Wings And Fly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [midnightseashell14](https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightseashell14/gifts).



* * *

The road under Baby’s tires was smooth and sun-dappled in the late afternoon light. It wound through the green forest sectioning off this slice of heaven from the others, Dean supposed, but it felt as though he had the entire place to himself. The sun cast golden beams through the needles of the tall pitch pine and cedar that Dean could smell when he rolled the windows down. It cut through the mountains, curving lazily around steep slopes where crystal-clear water cascaded down into mirror-like pools and ran along mountain streams on their long journey out to sea. If there _was_ a sea here in heaven, Dean thought. He wasn’t sure how far this road actually went. Perhaps he was driving in circles.

The ocean, though, now there was an idea. Dean leaned back in Baby’s leather seat and considered the fantasy briefly. Warm sand between his toes, a cold one in hand—now _that_ he could get in with. The heaven he left behind was nice and all, but it was missing a couple pretty key ingredients that Dean thought turquoise water and the smell of salt on the breeze might be able to fix.

“Okay, Jack, how does this work?” Dean asked out loud, “Do I just think something and then… _poof_! It’s a thing?”

As though in response, a sign suddenly appeared on the side of the road just as Dean turned the corner.

“ _Umbrella Beach_ , huh?” Dean said, reading it aloud. He lifted his eyes skyward—a habit he would have to reconsider now that he was cloud-hopping in heaven with Jack and the rest of the angels—and sent out a silent prayer of thanks. He slowed and turned onto the sandy road where the sign was pointing.

A few miles down the road, the forest opened up into a grassy plain, and beyond that, Dean could just make out a wooden bungalow on a pristinely-white beach. He parked Baby at the end of the road along a sandy turnaround and hopped out of the car. The weather was warmer here, he noted—the air smelled salty yet sweet, and the breeze on his face was sun-kissed and soft. Dean kicked off his boots, rolled the bottoms of his jeans up to his knees, and started down the grassy path that led to the sea.

A red and yellow-striped beach umbrella was set up over a lounge chair by the edge of the water. There was a cooler next to it and a couple of beach towels. No bathing suit in sight, though Dean was eager to try swimming without one. Something about flashing his junk around at a bunch of angels who may or may not be checking in on _that Winchester boy who finally bit it_ appealed to him. Later. After he spent a few hours soaking up the sun.

Dean collapsed into the chair with a contented sigh and cracked open the cooler. A case of _El_ _Sol_ stuck their frosty necks up out of a nest of half-melted ice. Dean grabbed one and knocked the cap off, settling back into the chair to enjoy his afternoon. After a few sips of watching the waves lap lazily at the shoreline, he had to admit, it was close to perfect.

Dean lowered his eyes to where the scalloped shadow of the beach umbrella met the sun, his thoughts slowly turning to the one person who could complete this paradise. Suddenly, he was in turmoil, torn between wanting to call out but afraid he would be denied the request.

To put off the inevitable, Dean pushed to his feet and with a fresh beer from the cooler, took off down the beach. He walked halfway in the water so that the waves crawled up his ankles and receded, leaving small divots under his feet that pitched him sideways.

It was a beautiful day. Or, whatever a ‘day’ meant in a place like this, in any case. The sun was in the sky, the breeze was light, and a few choice clouds floated lazily by in an otherwise pristine field of blue. Colors were more vibrant here in heaven, Dean noted after a moment of looking around, and the outlines of things were oddly blurred, as though the light that curled around it all refracted in a way that gave the world a strange, ethereal glow.

_‘Like a hologram?’_ Dean thought to himself, _‘Or a halo?’_

He continued along the beach, sipping every now and then from his beer. When it was finished, he glanced around for someplace to set it where he could pick it up on his way back, then blinked as a recycling bin appeared in his peripheral further up the beach.

“Convenient,” he muttered.

He was starting to understand how things worked here. He thought something, it happened. Dean wondered how far it went. Like, if he wanted to know what it was like to ride a dragon, would one suddenly appear in the sky offering for him to hop on? Did it work for friends? Family? Like…

Shit. He wasn’t nearly drunk enough for that train of thought.

A beer appeared in his hand.

“Okay, _that’s_ awesome,” Dean said aloud this time.

Dean continued down the beach, head bowed to the sandy shore winding endlessly in front of him. The rock pier that had looked like a mile or so out when he first started was no closer now, and he’d gone at _least_ a mile and a half by his count. Either he was on the shore to nowhere, or heaven went by the ‘arrive when you need to’ rule, which Dean guessed would make sense within the whole ‘as you wish it, so shall it be’ logic of this place.

Trying to figure out the metaphysics of heaven was starting to give him a headache though, so Dean shook his head and decided to leave it alone for now, even if it _was_ a good distraction from thinking about the one thing he _didn’t_ want to think about. Of course, much more of this and he’d be walking this beach until the sun burned out. Dean let out a frustrated sigh and turned around, back toward where his beach chair and cooler full of beer was waiting for him. Maybe the bungalow had a nice memory foam mattress. He could take a nap and stop wishing for things he had no right wanting in the first place.

Of course, he’d always been lousy at letting things go. He had a bad habit of poking at the beast until it reared its ugly head and lashed out at him, and here was no different.

So, when he arrived back at his private beach and saw that another chair had been added to the one with the cooler of beer next to it, he couldn’t pretend any longer. Either Jack was playing tricks on him, or his subconscious mind was screaming out so loudly it was affecting the reality of this place.

“Fuck it,” Dean muttered to himself, kicking at the sand. He downed the rest of his beer to bolster his courage and then said, “Cas? Castiel, who thou art I _hope_ somewhere in this weird-ass place and can still hear me… We really need to chat, buddy.”

When long seconds turned into minutes of waiting, Dean started to lose hope. Bobby had said Cas was back from The Empty—that he was okay. Cas helped to build this new heaven _._ He was probably busy doing angel stuff, right? Dean shouldn’t expect… Surely he would’ve come by now. He must not want…

Just when Dean was about to resign himself to the fact that Castiel was not going to show, there was the familiar sound of rumpling cloth, and then in the blink of an eye, Castiel appeared in front of him on the beach.

“ _Cas!_ ” Dean couldn’t help the boyish grin that stretched across his face at the sight of that familiar, blue-eyed squint. He dropped the bottle in his hand and ran forward, pulling Castiel into a hard embrace. “Shit,” he mumbled into the angel’s shoulder, “ _Shit._ Bobby _said_ , but—I really thought I lost you this time.”

Castiel wrapped his arms around Dean hesitantly, carefully, his touch so light it could barely be called an embrace at all. He pulled back far too quickly for Dean’s liking, and Dean frowned so that maybe Cas would get the hint.

“I am fine, Dean,” Castiel said, missing the social cue as always, “You, on the other hand…”

“Yeah, no thanks to you,” Dean bit out bitterly, shrugging out from under the hand Cas still had on his shoulder.

Dean watched as Castiel’s face _crumpled_ , and immediately he felt like the biggest asshole to have ever walked the Earth, Chuck included. How he ever gained the talent of saying the exact wrong thing at the worst possible moment would forever be a mystery to him.

“Cas, I—” Dean floundered for a moment, then sighed, frustrated, and scrubbed a hand over his mouth. “Shit, that’s not what I meant.”

Castiel’s squint grew narrower.

“Then what _did_ you mean?” the angel asked gruffly.

“I—nothing. Just, you never came back after Jack sprung you from The Empty, and I thought—hell, I dunno _what_ I thought, but I guess I expected you to at least pop down and let me and Sammy know.”

“Dean—” Castiel started to say, but Dean could hear the excuse on his tongue from a mile away. Anger flashed through him again in an instant, furious and burning.

“No, Cas—that’s the _first_ thing you do. Screw Jack, screw heaven— _I_ needed to know you were okay,” Dean told him, jabbing a thumb into his chest, “‘Cause I sure as hell _wasn’t_.”

For the second time that day, Castiel looked at him with blue eyes that swam with regret.

“I’m…sorry,” the angel returned.

Dean’s anger dissolved under the waver in his voice.

“Come here,” he said, pulling Cas into another hug. Gentler this time, and less desperate. Relief flooded through him as Dean cradled Castiel’s head to his own, closed his eyes, and just _stood_ with the fact that it was _Cas_ in his arms and that he was _okay_ —more than okay, in fact. He was full-on angel again. “I’m sorry too,” he croaked, swallowing around the sudden lump in his throat.

This time when Castiel wrapped his arms around Dean, they were warm and enveloping, just as Dean remembered. He sighed into the feeling of them.

“You weren’t there when I arrived,” Dean said to him while he was still in the circle of Cas’s arms.

He felt the angel suck in a breath and go a little rigid.

“I…wasn’t sure if you wanted to see me,” he replied hesitantly.

Dean pulled back and pinned Castiel with a steely look.

“Of course I wanted to see you,” Dean said with conviction, “Why the hell would you think that?” he demanded.

Castiel’s eyes shifted away, dropping to the sandy shore beneath their feet.

“I thought…” Castiel’s eyes flickered up and met his tentatively. “I assumed…after what I said…” he trailed off, and Dean could feel his heart thudding away in his chest at the uncertainty in the angel’s voice. He couldn’t really blame Castiel for having doubts about them when he’d thought the exact same thing for the better part of a decade.

“Well, you’re an idiot,” Dean told him, the tone of his voice fond. He cradled Castiel’s face in his hands, pressing their foreheads together. “ _God_ , Cas. I thought I made this pretty clear in Purgatory, but… I guess not. Guess I gotta spell it out for you. About what you said? Well, it’s the same for me too. I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted...” Dean paused and licked his lips, sucking in a breath as he continued. “I just…never thought it was possible. I mean, I didn’t think you _could_ feel stuff like that, or if you did, then it wasn’t gonna be for me.”

Castiel’s brow furrowed, and he seemed almost insulted by Dean’s words.

“How could you think that?” Castiel asked him in disbelief, “I _fell_ for you, Dean. I rebelled against heaven and everything I’ve ever known for _you._ ” The angel’s voice grew quiet, more subdued as he continued. “And then, after I Fell, I kept falling. I continued to fall every day, deeper and deeper until I was so far gone I forgot what the world was like before the moment I gripped you tight and raised you from perdition.”

That brought a small smile to Dean’s face. He brushed the pads of his thumbs along the scruff of Castiel’s cheekbones and looked into eyes that were so close and so impossibly blue he felt as though he were drowning in them.

“So now what?” Dean asked gently, “I’m dead, and you’re still an angel. Not exactly an ideal situation.”

“I don’t know,” Castiel said with a mysterious lilt to his voice, “I suppose it depends on how you look at things.” Castiel held Dean’s gaze, carefully noting the hunter’s reaction as he said, “Jack is in the process of recruiting new angels. He is under the impression you would make a compelling candidate.”

Dean scoffed and stepped back, letting him go.

“Yeah, well you can tell Jack thanks, but no thanks,” he said with a shake of his head, “No offense, but the thought of being some emotionless fluffy-winged robot isn’t my kind of party—not to mention the whole possessing people thing. I don’t want what happened with Jimmy and Claire happening to anyone else, at least not on my watch.”

“And if that wasn’t an issue?” Castiel pressed, “Jack has reformed the new generation of angels, Dean. They have souls. They _feel_ things, and they understand free will. Vessels are no longer necessary because these angels were all once human. They simply continue to exist in the bodies they were born with.”

“Okay. That’s great and all, but my body is still rotting somewhere six feet deep,” Dean pointed out, “Or—if Sam has a shred of good sense left in him—charred up nice and crispy. Can’t exactly come back from a hunter’s barbeque when you’re the guest of honor.”

“You know that isn’t true,” Castiel argued, frowning slightly. He let out a breath through his nose. “I told Jack you would decline his offer.”

“Yeah? What’d the _New God_ have to say about that?” Dean asked condescendingly.

“He seemed to think I could convince you to change your mind,” Castiel told him, bristling, “He was under the—frankly _insane_ impression that the prospect of spending an eternity with me would be a compelling enough reason for you to accept his offer.”

“So that’s his plan, huh?” Dean said cynically, “Kid’s really giving Chuck a run for his money, I’ll give him that.”

Castiel ducked his head and Dean watched as he swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat.

“I told him it was pointless to even suggest it,” Castiel said. He gestured around at the beach chairs and umbrella. “Why should you want to give up all of this just to… This _is_ what you want, after all, isn’t it? For you and Sam to sit on a beach and drink beer and build sand castles…”

“Is _that_ what you think I want?” Dean asked, smiling a little in amusement. He reached out and grabbed the angel’s hand, brushing his thumb along the underside of his wrist. He felt Castiel give a nearly imperceptible shiver as he did and said, gently, “Cas, the extra chair isn’t meant for Sammy. It’s for _you_.”

“I cannot stay here with you, Dean,” Castiel told him quickly, “I have responsibilities now. Jack—”

“Yeah, I know,” Dean said, feeling the sting of his rejection. “Come on, at least stay for a beer.”

“Yes…alright,” Castiel relented, “One beer.”

Dean smiled to himself and plopped down into his chair, reaching for the cooler. Castiel very deliberately sat down next to him and accepted the beer Dean handed to him. The angel squinted out at the ocean, then looked down at his drink. He seemed uneasy for some reason.

“I am… not certain what one does at the beach,” Castiel said after a minute.

“Well, for one, they don’t wear trench coats,” Dean told him. He reached over and tugged at the angel’s sleeve. “Come on, man, lose the layers.”

“I don’t see how my apparel is relevant,” Castiel said, looking down at his usual getup. Dean quirked an eyebrow at him and received an eye roll in return. After a moment of deliberation, Castiel shrugged off his coat and laid it over the back of his chair.

“Shoes,” Dean said, pinning Cas with a look, “Socks too. I’m gettin’ hot just looking at you.”

“That is inaccurate and moreover, impossible here,” Castiel informed him, but again, he did as Dean suggested. After another moment of consideration, he lost the suit jacket too and rolled up his shirt sleeves, then did the same with his pants. He dug his bear toes into the sand and released a pleasant sigh.

“There you go. Feels good, right?” Dean asked him. He smiled as the angel cocked his head and considered his question seriously.

“I suppose the freedom of movement that comes from the shedding of excess clothing could be considered pleasing,” he concluded.

Dean snorted into his beer and rolled his eyes.

“You know, you could just as easily have said yes,” he pointed out. He shifted his eyes to the angel, whose lips were turned upward into the slightest of smirks.

“I could, but it wouldn’t be nearly as enjoyable as witnessing your reactions to my unorthodox answers,” Castiel said playfully.

“And here I thought you were being obtuse on accident,” Dean grumbled. His lowered his eyes and hid a blush behind another gulp of beer. “So Jack’s recruiting new angels, huh?”

“He seems to think that the fact they were once human will help mitigate the corruption that nearly led to heaven’s downfall.”

“Famous last words,” Dean muttered, “Still, he’s got you to help him. Least I know if he starts letting the power go to his head, you’ll be there to pull him back in line.”

“Hmph. Now there is an irony,” Castiel said. He picked idly at the label to his beer. “ _Me_ , telling _God_ what to do.”

Dean felt the corners of his mouth curve upwards.

“Hey, someone’s gotta do it,” the hunter told him. He sucked in a breath and held it in his chest for a second before adding, “But…maybe you don’t have to do it alone.”

Castiel’s eyes shot up to meet his, wide and transparently blue.

“Dean…what are you saying?”

Dean smiled shyly at him.

“I’m sayin’ an eternity is a long time,” Dean said. He looked down at the sand and dug into it with his big toe, hesitating only briefly before saying, “But uh... guess I wouldn’t mind it so much if you were there with me.”

“Dean… are you proposing we fly off into the sunset together?” Castiel asked him, smirking a little.

Dean’s gaze shot up to meet his. He blushed furiously and growled a little as he insisted, “I didn’t _say_ that!” Castiel merely smiled delightedly at him. Dean grunted and kicked at the sand again, then mumbled, “Guess I’m not, _not_ sayin’ it either.” Slowly, Dean looked back up at the angel and asked hesitantly, “Well? What’dya say, Cas?”

“I say…” Castiel trailed off, gulped down any remaining butterflies and said simply, “Yes.”

A brilliant smile stretched automatically across Dean’s face.

“Good. It’s a date,” the hunter flirted at him.

The generous blush that painted Castiel’s cheeks had Dean grinning widely and vowing to say more embarrassing things to the angel in the future, his macho-man persona be damned.

“Hey,” Dean said, tugging at his shirt sleeve, “You ever make a sand angel?”

Castiel shook his head.

“But you’ve heard of snow angels, right?” Dean asked. At Castiel’s nod, he grinned and rose to his feet. “So? It’s like that. Come on, I’ll show you.”

He held out his hand. Castiel took it and allowed Dean to pull him to his feet and lead him out from under the shadow of the umbrella. They laid down head-to-head on the sand, spreading their arms and legs wide and making shallow trenches in the sand with their limbs.

When Dean was finished, he sat up and surveyed his and Cas’s handiwork.

“Hm. Guess it works better with snow,” Dean said, pulling a face.

“As soon as we move, we will mess them up,” Castiel pointed out.

“True,” Dean said.

He laid back down and closed his eyes, folding his hands over his middle. After a moment he heard the angel let out a faint sigh and out of his peripheral could see that Castiel had done the same. They were silent for a long time, long enough that Dean almost started dozing off.

“Dean, I have a proposition to make,” Castiel said suddenly.

“Yeah? What is it?” Dean asked, his eyes still closed. He could feel the angel hesitating and waited patiently for him to continue.

“I would like it if we were to come back here every now and then. You deserve to have a place like this to relax, and it would be nice to spend some time together…” Castiel trailed off and Dean didn’t have to look to know that the angel was blushing as he continued in a stutter. “As…as long as there aren’t any pressing matters to attend to, I would like it very much if we could come here and drink beer and…perhaps make more sand angels together.”

Dean grinned.

“I’d like that too,” he said, rolling over in the sand and propping himself up on his elbows, to where he was staring down into Cas’s eyes. “Kind of like Superman’s Fortress of Solitude, right?”

Castiel nodded.

“Does that make me Lois Lane?” Castiel asked in his signature gravelly voice.

“Naw,” Dean said, grinning at him, “You can be my Superman, Cas.”

Then he leaned down and pressed his lips lightly against the angel’s mouth.

Dean felt it as Castiel’s lips trembled and then fell open with a gasp, and then the angel surged upward in a sudden impulse of _need_ and _want_ , capturing Dean’s mouth entirely with his own. Both of his hands went behind the hunter’s head and threaded through his hair, and Dean grunted and then gasped as he yielded his mouth open and felt the angel’s tongue slide in against his.

“I bet that bungalow has a really nice bed,” Dean murmured when they broke apart, and it might have been the lingering buzz from the kiss, or the beer, or the heady scent of salt on the breeze—hell, it could have been a lot of things—but Dean honestly hadn’t mean to say that out loud. “Uh.” He blinked. “Th-that’s not—I mean, that’s not really something angels do, right? Forget I even—”

“ _Dean_ ,” Castiel interrupted, sitting up and shifting closer to him on the beach as Dean did the same. He took Dean’s hand in his and continued. “What you are implying… It is cautioned against, but not forbidden among angels.”

“Seriously?” Dean blurted out.

Castiel nodded.

“Yes. It is rare, but there _are_ those who have chosen… _companionship_ over Revelations.” Castiel’s voice lowered and he looked away. “Though, I’ll admit I didn’t see the appeal of such a thing until I met you.”

“Why Cas, it almost sounds like you’re proposing we do some cloud-seeding together,” Dean flirted, smirking at him.

Castiel felt a blush prickle at his cheeks.

“The thought did cross my mind,” the angel mumbled. His hand around Dean’s shifted nervously. Dean didn’t let him think about it too much, just pulled him in for another kiss.

“You know this technically counts as necrophilia, right?” Dean joked when he pulled back, grinning at the angel, “Or like, bestiality.”

“We could stop,” Castiel said flatly.

“Forget it,” Dean blurted out, quickly kissing him again. 

Castiel hummed into his lips, and when they drew apart, he asked, “Is this what one typically does at the beach?”

Dean grinned at him and said, “Yeah, pretty much. That and build sand castles.” He laughed at the look Castiel shot him and then answered seriously, “Mainly you just soak up the sun, swim, maybe walk the beach holding hands...” He trailed off and shrugged. “And um…watching the sunset together. That’s a thing too.”

“I thought we were _flying_ off into the sunset together,” Castiel reminded him.

“Yeah, well, you haven’t asked me yet,” Dean said, looking away. He could feel the blush crawling up his neck and hoped it wasn’t too visible.

Dean glanced back at Castiel and watched as a smile stretched slowly across the angel’s face.

“Would you like to fly off into the sunset with me, Dean?” Castiel asked him.

“ _Hell_ yes,” Dean replied. He grinned back, feeling goofy and lightheaded with happiness. “C’mere, I wasn’t finished with you,” he mumbled, pulling the angel into him again and covering his lips with a sigh.

The kiss this time felt different, Dean thought. More of a promise. Like a reunion and a homecoming, all in one. Finally, he was right where he wanted to be.

Dean grabbed Cas’s hand when they broke apart and pulled him to his feet.

“Well? We doing this thing or not?” he teased, gesturing out to sea and grinning like a buffoon, “Come on, Superman. Lois Lane me already.”

Castiel grinned and stepped forward, hefting Dean bridle-style into his arms. He closed his eyes briefly in concentration and Dean gasped as a pair of iridescent, mother-of-pearl colored wings suddenly emerged from between his shoulder blades. Castiel leapt into the sky, and with one large beat of the near fifteen-foot appendages, glided out over the sea. Far on the horizon, the sun was just starting to set in a brilliant display of color. Dean closed his eyes and relaxed into the feeling of the breeze on his face and the soft sound of the wind whispering through Castiel’s feathers, and thought about what it would be like to have his own set of wings—to have the ability to go anywhere he wished in the blink of an eye, whether it be here in heaven or on a real beach somewhere. Either way, he knew he wanted Cas there with him, because _that_ was _his_ idea of heaven.

Dean opened his eyes with a contented sigh, and with the feeling of Castiel’s arms around him, he looked out toward their future together.

_End?_

**Author's Note:**

> The title and the name of Dean's heavenly beach come from the Owl City song _Umbrella Beach._


End file.
